Warbird Information Exchange

I don't believe Bill that there is a AD on the T-28s tail. There is a mod out to reenforce the stabs. It was developed years ago and the AF adopted it although the Navy didn't. I think T-28 tail loss can be attributed to pilot error ie over g and flying into bad weather. John Herlihy did a great acro routine with his T-28B and he never had the stab mob on his.
Over to the experts.

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Don't touch my junk!!

There is no AD Bill. you are 100% Jack.

Bill - not to try and start a word war here, but we must remember that the T-28 was designed as an advanced trainer, the follow-up to the T-6. It is rather disingenuous to compare it to the P-51 or the F-86, and what combat history it did have was incidental to its original design, similar to the AT-6 and, by a bit of a stretch, the A-37.

Bill Greenwood Wrote "But I don't think many historians would rank the Vietnam War as of the same significance as WWII. It was not a "world war", though it had major costs in lives and money...."

gary1954 wrote: Alot, and I mean a lot of people call the "war" in Korea, the "Korean Conflict" which is technically correct since "War" was not declared - technically....but when different Armies are shooting at each other, and bombing each other, to me...that's a war...so was the Korean Conflict(war) ranked the same way there Bill? Not trying a toss a grenade here or crap in my own mess kit...I am merely perplexed at this twist in the thread. I tend to agree with Tom (Hang The Expense) the tail wheel is on the wrong end.

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Kind Regards,
Gary Lewis
J.A.F.O.

T28 Pilot wrote:
I

have a followup question...could Jack be any less than 100% ?

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"You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass..."
Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto

I was lucky enough to get some acro time in one (from the backseat) and they are a great airplane.

(Rumour has it) they were stuck way up high with the training wheel on the wrong end in order to train jet jockeys for what was coming.

Subsequently their mission was "expanded" and they shot at people and people shot at them and the pilots logged it as Combat Time.

Mudge-meister... Don't pass up the chance to fly in any well maintained example is my humble advice!

SPANNER

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Support Your Local Warbirds! KBO!
The only reasons the airplanes matter is what the veterans did with them... and why.

Spanner is correct. I have a friend who had thousands of hours as a Navy T-28 instructor at Pensacola and on the Lady Lex. He said the tricycle gear arrangement, tall gear legs, and complex systems were intentionally very jet-like in order to prepare student pilots for their big transition into fighter jets. He raves about how much fun the T-28 was to fly. With 1,450 HP on tap, it must be a blast!

Personally, I think it's a sharp looking machine, and I get a kick out of that funky, "old washing machine" sound from the engine (which, incidentally, sounds VERY much like an FM-2 Wildcat).

Cheers!

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Dean Hemphill, K5DH
Port Charlotte, Florida

They are truly wonderful fun to passenge in, and performance-wise are a great photo bird. The problem for the latter, though is that there are few flat areas in the canopy so distortion can be a problem, and sun reflections in that huge expanse of glass are a huge and eternal difficulty. These shots done from Bob Nightingale's Fennec, which i think does have a combat history...

Count me in as a great fan of T-28s, though!

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Neal Nurmi

---Wingman Photo---

Dean is correct. The NAVY was looking for an airplane after the T-34 to transition students to jets. When the US NAVY flew the A model they told NAA it would work except with that 800hp engine it was normaly powered. The NAVY said give us more HP. The B model was born and Bob Hoover test flew it(with the R1820). My dad went thru the program as described in 1966 with my T-28C in the squadron of airplanes he flew(and CQ'd on the Lex). T-34's, T-28's and then the F9F, straight from the horses mouth, or horses *ss(I can say that cause he's my dad! )

I have flown many times as a camera ship. The canopy can be opened at any speed.
I have flown formation with all types of fighters and trainers, both as lead and as wingman. The T-28B/C will hold its own with all of them. Its funny to have a P-51 say give me as few inches on the climb during a join up cause the temps are going up.
I could go on and on but I have an SNJ to work on so I wont beat this up.
One thing is for sure, it sure beats jumping into a C172 for an hour!!

Chuck Wahl

Re: the T-28 tail and mod. Now I am not a T-28 guru by any means, me talking about technical matters on this is a little like Gov .Moose Mom talking about reading books; it is mostly hearsay rather than experience. So I may be technically wrong about there being an AD on the tail. HOWEVER, I am almost certain that about 10 years ago there were cracks found in the tail, perhaps more than one fatal accident and I am CERTAIN that when my friends were lost south of Denver the tail came off in the air. Jack, it is so common to blame pilot error to try to cover up a design or maintenance problem in a plane. This was done about V tail Bonanzas for decades. Finally, after HUNDREDS of people had been killed in them, the FAA got involved and ordered a major study and review of the design and found the flaws or at least the tender spots( control cable tension and ruddervator balance, that could happen even below Vne in VMC.). Any fair minded person with common sense could see that it was not logical that pilots of the same experience and ability were not having in flight break ups in straight tail Bonanzas or in Mooneys. Did they only get dumb and slopply in the v tails? Did they only fly too fast or lose control in IMC in v tails? Baloney! The proof was when the problem was found and addressed with a mod kit and/or tighter maintenance, guess what? All the v tail pilots must have gotten smarter overnight as the problem went away, I have not heard of such a fatality in years. By the way I once saw a Mooney 231 at Dugosh in Kerrville in which the pilot had lost control in IMC and came out the bottom in a screaming dive, and pulled so hard the wings were bent, like less dihedral, but it stayed together.

So, as I said, I am no 28 expert. But when the tail problem was discovered in civilian use, it turned out the military had had similar problems,just as Jack wrote, and I am pretty sure a mod kit, if not an AD was developed and seemed to take care of it as far as I have heard. Jack, my friend was certainly doing acro, just as he had done many times with Dick Jones in his T-6 and never pulled the tail off it. There was no IMC weather involved.

So all you Trojan butt sniffers, give us the scoop was there a tail problen and a mod and has it taken care of the problem? Seems I recall lots about it in NATA and at Osh forums.

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Bill Greenwood
Spitfire N308WK

The tail along with the nose gear has always been the weak points of the T-28. NAA came out with the stab mod has I said and the AF implimented it but the Navy didn't. There was never any AD or req inspections beyond that of the annual. One T-28 that had the mod done to it went through a thunderstorm and got the cr*p beat of it and way over g'ed but stayed together. It also has a P & W R-2000 or more likely a R-2800 in it. It has a VF-84 paint scheme. I doubt you'll find 1 T-28 crash were the stabs failed and it wasn't related to WX or g's.

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Don't touch my junk!!

I just looked up the index of NATA. For Oct 95,it list an article about "T-28 horizontal stabilator failure". I don't have the details. Another one Jan 96, and they weren't written by me.

I don't think I have ever read of a T-28n failure tail failure related to weather. I also doubt if the failure occurred unless some g was involved. The tail did not fall off sitting on the ground. But if it is a military trainer, and acro rated, it should be able to pull 5 or 6 gs ok. If not, what did they expect he jet pilots to do in combat, stick to standard rate turns?

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Bill Greenwood
Spitfire N308WK

More like a John Deere 'A'

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"They can teach MONKEYS to fly better than that"

http://www.heritageflight.org
http://www.bravo369.org

Either way bet you look up when you hear one. Kind of like being in Fredericksburg last weekend and NOT looking up when that Spitfire and Mustang flew over......right. If that don't get your adrelelin going nothing will.

All you Trojan soldiers didn't write perhaps the best feature of the T-28; that it is affordable, at least compared to a WWII fighter or bomber. You can likely get a flyable 28 for $150k and a good one for under $300 k, last time I looked, and that is before we got into the America Going Out OF Business Sale. Prices now are likely lower. In any event, you can get a 28 one price step up from a T-6 and perhaps 1/5 the price of a P-40 or 1/8 the price of a Mustang. Courtesy had one for sale at Oshkosh asking $600,000, believe it or not, don't know if they reeled in any suckerfish on that one. But that's like ordering a $40 bottle of imported water at a fancy restaurant, not the norm. For $600 k you can buy two T-6s and a Corvette to drive out to it.

They also have a big and supportive owners group, like the T-6s, or did have last time I looked. This is worth something to the new owner coming into warbirds, with pilot and maintenance tips and events to attend. Their formation video is a good basic tool to use.

So see guys, I do know some good things about 28s. Now as for looks, that's a matter of personal taste. Some guys think an Suv looks better than a Porsche, and Queen Lativa is their ideal lady, just like some dog owners would rather have a pit bull( with or without lipstick ) than a German Shepard.

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Bill Greenwood
Spitfire N308WK